Blog Posts

The world is waking up to animals. As people become aware of the horrors of factory farms, puppy mills, zoos, circuses, and various forms of racing, concern for animal welfare is growing. As cruel as human begins are to animals, I still have faith that most of us care about the beings with whom we share the Earth.

As writers, we have a special obligation. We must be aware of animal suffering in the way that we must be aware of human suffering. It comes with the job.

Could the days of making big (if not easy) money selling your ebooks through Amazon be over?

If you have ebooks on sale through Amazon and participate in Kindle Unlimited and/or the Kindle Owners' Lending Library, chances are you have become aware of the change with regard to your Kindle royalties.

If you are starting out and considering whether or not you want to participate in Amazon's Kindle Unlimited and/or the Kindle Owners' Lending Library, this is for you too.

This week on [REALITY CHECK] Jim Brown offers some background and insight into Amazon's latest game-changing strategy, and it is something you need to understand because it could affect the way you publish through Amazon--if you do so at all.…

Sometimes when people find out that I'm an author, they ask if I write under my own name or if I use a pseudonym. Given how hard it is to generate awareness about my books using the name I've had myentire life, this question always makes me laugh. However, I do think for some authors a pen name isn't necessarily a bad idea, so I thought it was worth writing a blog post on the subject.

If you've already published a book, then you've learned first-hand how much effort goes into promoting it, no matter who your publisher is. And if you've read my blog with any regularity you'll see that many of my suggestions for book marketing involve tapping into personal and professional networks. College alumni magazines and alumni groups, fraternity/sorority connections, business associations, social media accounts - these all offer receptive, credible channels for getting news about your book out to…

One of the things I like most about being an editor is my exposure to a wildly diverse array of books. Over the years, I’ve worked on everything from novels to prescriptive nonfiction to memoir to cookbooks, and I’ve learned something new from each manuscript I’ve touched.

Despite the variability of the content I’ve edited, however, what remains a constant is authors’ misuse of certain phrases and expressions in their writing. Sometimes called eggcorns, these terms retain their original intended meaning but employ the wrong words to do so. I’ve been keeping a tally of the ten most common examples of these errors, and while I’m no etymologist, I’d love to know where things went awry for the…

"This aspect of publishing drove me nutso with my first book and has made me drag my feet on the second one: literary fiction or historical fiction? Well, can't it be both? Women's fiction is huge, that might broaden my base, but the…"